brighton pavilion, tea & geeky seed heads

Today I met my cousin (he’s eccentric, a bit of a black sheep, shall we say) …  also delightful company and down in Brighton on a little two week poetry writing holiday.  He’s in his mid 60s, lives in Mexico, and I love him to bits.




We went round Brighton Pavilion … I haven’t been for about 10 years, so it was a delight for me … the building just oozes excess and sex.  As Cuz said “Well, Minnie, [family nickname, long story] this just proves that nothing succeeds like excess”




I had my quilt top with me because I had to go buy batting (bamboo … gone up in price to £12 per metre … eeek!) so I really really wanted to take some guerilla pics in the Pavilion … you know, draped over a chair in the banqueting room …





[imagine photo here]

or draped over the King’s bed … honestly you’d need a springboard - 6 mattresses!





[imagine photo here]


or draped over a cellist in the music room ….




[imagine photo & sexy cellist here]


Yeah, well, I chickened out … too many ‘no photo’ signs and helpful knowledgeable guides - you don’t want to upset them  … ultimate deterrent.






The best I got was a quick shot on the Pavilion railings, but the quilt was so bloody huge and the railings so bloody small that  it could be any railings anywhere … LOL … epic photo fail!


I like the spotlights though, even though they are facing the wrong way … *ahem

anyway, if you want to see what I saw watch this, it’s fab 

- the guide featured is wonderful, she really understands this building! :

Then we had tea in the Pavilion gardens … it’s one of my favourite places … just tucked away right in the middle of everything.


Proper old fashioned park cafe.  None of yer fancy double mocha choc half fat decaff water stuff here. 

Oh no.

Finger burningly hot steel teapots and a nice rock cake.  Bliss.
 
It’s somewhere I come and sit and people watch, often. 
I like seeing the little old ladies have the sandwiches they’ve sneaked in under the radar get swooped on by gulls …

heh heh heh … swoop or get swooped on. That’s life, baby.



And we went for another wander through the gardens …  and I noticed these fably geeky seed heads …



 

How cool? 










perfect little 5-point stars … *sigh











Thus was spent a fruitful afternoon …
I like holidays.





p.s. you’ve still got about 2.5 hrs (in all honesty about 8)  left for my giveaway for 16 FQs of really cool Christmas fabric … If you’re not into giveaways, or you’ve already entered (gold star) you should go visit just to read the comments … they’re wonderful … each one a little short story in the making … just sayin …

Scrappy {Hoop} Swap - Love Wins

Back in October, when I signed up to my first swap - the Scrappy {Hoop} swap - I really didn’t know what to expect.  I was deeply touched that people would take time to craft a thing of loveliness and then send it to someone they may not know (or indeed ever meet) out there in that boundary-laden, physical world of ours.  

I knew I wanted to join in.  I like anything that embraces and exploits the lack of geographical boundary here in the Blogolopolis.  

And frankly, who wouldn’t want to get involved when something like this arrives, from jennirc, all those boundaries away, in Texas?

thank you Jenni.

At this point it may not be entirely cool to admit that I’ve never really subscribed to all that “It’s better to give than to receive” stuff.  I know I should, and in many ways I do ... ish.  But, I’m so happy I took part and I genuinely zoomed in on the pleasure I had from making the hoop for my partner.

Whoa! **insert sound of stylus screeching across vinyl**  

Was I mad?

Opening up that Priority Mail envelope, ripping through that beautiful rainbow stripey tissue paper, prising open that ziploc bag and revealing something that had been made with great thought just for me … ?

... Blissful.

So now I've moved along to 

“It’s really great to receive if you have given”

 ...  we're making progress ... 

Love Wings

My Creative Space - Happy Thanks-giveaway-ing

So, today’s the real Thanksgiving, eh?

Well, my creative space is brimming over with thankfulness.

While yesterday I was being thankful in low key reflective mode,  today I’m jumping about with much more cheery thankfulness:

On an entirely material level, I am thankful for Giveaways!  

Last night my return from work was greeted by a whopping amount of randomly generated booty from I’m a Ginger Monkey’s Scrap Vomit Technicolour Yawn giveaway! 


Honestly !  There isn’t a “Yay!” typographically big enough to describe my squeaky jump for joy happiness as I lifted the lid of a rather yummy brown cardboard box to reveal this not-so-little lot.

pic from I'm a Ginger Monkey

Wowza Katy, thank you so much! it was like opening a treasure chest!  I don’t think I’ve ever had that many new FQs in me mitts before. (Other than when doing a bit of furtive fabric stroking in shops, that is)  

I am truly thankful.  

-- Especially as one of the fabrics seems to be the key piece that brings together all my random thoughts about the (as yet still imaginary) quilt project ...

... Stay tuned … I think I may be onto something ... more pics another day …

I promise to pay it forward with a new giveaway very very soon - 

But until I do, there’s another fab giveaway over here at I’m A Ginger Monkey - it’s only open to the UK though  … but it’s for this fantastic stack of 19 FQs of solids, THE HURRICANE, from Backstitch - go check it out! - it runs until November 29th :)

pic from I'm a Ginger Monkey

Don’t forget you’ll have something else to be thankful for if you pop on over to Kirsty’s and take a while to immerse yourself in all that lovely talented creativity …